Mined lives

A sizeable population of villages neighbouring the border is crippled and maimed. Seema Sharma traces the reasons behind the tragedy

EVEN a decade after the Kargil war was fought, its tragic reverberations continue to echo in the tales of numerous villagers, living in the nondescript border areas of Suchetgarh and RS Pura, who have lost their limbs in landmine blasts.

Almost all border villages have the same tales to tell. A sizeable number of people in these villages can be seen limping on their crutches or shakily walking on artificial legs.

The Army had put in landmines in the fields close to the border area during the Kargil conflict in 1999 to foil attempts of intrusion by the Pakistani army. These live landmines remained there for almost five years. During that period, villagers were forbidden to do farming in the area.

Later, as the threat of invasion subsided, the Army began removing the landmines. After the task was completed, the entire zone was declared "risk free". But blasts continued to happen for the next one year as several landmines had remained undetected and embedded in fields.

Although most landmines can be detected easily, a few may remain untraceable because of their low metal content. A landmine can also change its position due to rains, erosion or soil movement. Hence landmine maps cannot be relied upon when these devices are being removed. So even after being declared "risk-free", the border area continues to remain a big minefield.

Villagers, who became victims of these accidental landmine blasts, however, have got no compensation from the Army, only a paltry sum from the government. Most of the victims received only Rs 5,000 as compensation.

Scarred by the physical and mental trauma of losing a limb, the plight of the victims is easy to understand. Their misfortune has affected their families as well. The future of their children, too, seems doomed due to such accidents.

The tragedy has come as a double whammy for many of these farming families, as they have already lost their fields to the Army for border fencing. For the past seven years they have not farmed their land and have not got any compensation either. And now after these blasts, the victims are even unable to farm whatever land they have been left with. The series of crisis have left them debt-ridden.

Manjit Singh (39), a farmer at Bula Chak village of RS Pura, is left with no option but to work as a labourer. First he lost a limb in a landmine blast, then he lost all his land (four killas) to border fencing, without getting a single penny as compensation. His attempts to navigate the bureaucratic and political channels have come to a naught.

He shudders to think of the fateful day when he lost his leg. He says, "I had gone to work in my fields in January, 2004, when a blast took place. Before I could understand anything, I saw a huge amount of blood oozing out of my leg and lost consciousness. When I regained consciousness after a couple of days , I found myself in hospital, with half of my leg amputated."

Manjit Singh, the only brother of four sisters, was shattered more so as his fourth sister was scheduled to get married just four days after the accident took place.

His life changed forever. "I wanted to study and become a government officer, but my destiny has made me a labourer," he says with pain. Despite the tragedy, he still retains his positive attitude as he is thankful to the Almighty for having spared his life. He can at least look after his parents with whatever little he earns.

The fateful day not only brought bad news for Manjit but also pulled Vijay Kumar into the same hell. Vijay, another farmer of same village, came to help an injured Manjit Singh. As soon as he came near Manjit, his own leg was blown to pieces due to another landmine blast. These two tragedies on a single day shook the entire village.

Vijay, who has two children — an 11-year-old son and a four-year-old daughter — is surviving on one killa land. His wife is a big support for him, as Vijay can hardly work with his artificial leg. His wife now has to slog in the fields as well as at home. "I had always dreamt to see my children get good education and do better than me in life. But with this meagre money, these dreams are now a distant possibility," he rues.

After six months of Vijay’s brush with death, his sister-in-law, Vimla Devi, 35, also lost a leg in a similar incident. But unlike others, she did not get even the paltry compensation of Rs 5,000. "My children were very young at that time. My sons were seven and 10, respectively, while my daughter was only a few months old at the time of the tragedy. It was heart-wrenching for me to see my small children doing household chores like sweeping and cleaning, while my husband did the cooking. I use an artificial leg now, but I can’t do much with it. In fact I can’t even cook on the chulha (earthen stove)."

Her children, too, vouch for the tough time the family has seen. Says her son Sukhvinder, who now cooks for the family, "We had a different childhood. When other children would play and have fun, we used to juggle between household chores and school." Vimla’s husband rears sheep to earn a living.

Another victim, Krishan Lal, 55, had to sell a major part of his 16- kanal land to marry off his three daughters after tragedy struck him in 2003 when he lost a limb in a landmine blast while working in his fields. His only son, Sethi Kumar, could not study after matric, while the daughters could not go beyond Classes IV and V, as he could not bear the expenses of their education.

He laments: "Tears, too, have dried up after all these years. The Rs 5,000, which the government gave us, could only buy me five injections for my operation. I had to sell a part of my land for the operation and for cumbersome recovery later, while another major chunk was sold when I had to marry off my daughters."

Their tragedy, which has become common place, has failed to move officials and politicians, who, too, have not been of much help to them beyond expressing lip sympathy.

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